Voices of the Year - BlogHer 2012

Blogging affords me a certain level of comfort. I can tell you a personal story and string words together to make you feel something while keeping myself at a safe distance. I might be overcome with emotion when writing and might even cry but those of you reading won't know because the only gauge you have are the words I give you. You can't peer through the screen while I'm writing and see what I'm feeling. I was selected to read Ministrations at BlogHer's Voices of the Year.

When I wrote that post in April...I cried.

I cried because I still have moments when I am tired of being different, moments when I wish I could blend, moments when I judge myself too harshly. But, I also shed tears because I am so relieved that I have the insight to recognize those moments and dare myself to be braver.

Writing words on a page and reading those words to a roomful of people are very different things.

When I stepped onto the stage to read, I was visible in a way that I have not been since I began blogging. I stood there looking so very queer and read a piece about coming to terms with that.

I wasn't nervous about reading the words.

I was nervous about feeling them.

And I did feel them and the earth didn't swallow me whole.

I can't imagine a better audience than the one at Voices of the Year. A roomful of bloggers cheering for you? I'll take it.

I appreciate every single person who came up to me afterwards with kind words and all those who tweeted their support. I'm still high days later.

Thank you to Deborah, the best blog wife ever, for recording this and sending it to me to post.

Also, thank you to Polly who introduced me. I was struck by the fact that Polly and I met and became friends in Minneapolis in 1993 but lost touch after she moved to California. We met again through blogging and, last Friday, shared the stage.

http://youtu.be/oLNM8aDVdxk

Check out the rest of the readers at Voices of the Year (links to the original posts unless otherwise noted):

Elizabeth Jayne Liu: To the Person who Stole My Gordita Fund

Lori Volkman: Fish-Infested Waters

Jenny Feldon: Life Lessons in the Seafood Section

Arnebya Herndon: Walk This Way

Liz McGuire: On Being Nine

Neil Kramer: The Poet at the Genius Bar

Issa Mas: The Horror of Mealtime

Susan Goldberg: It's Always Something

Dresden Shumaker: Welfare Queen (Video taken at Voices of the Year)

Jane Byers Goodwin: Dick Clark and Our Sofa

Suzanne Barston: You've (not) Come a Long Way, Baby

Barbara Becker: The Swastika in the Neighborhood

Varda Steinhardt: Holding Hands

Shari Simpson: The Best/Worst "Female" Story You Will Ever Read

STILL TO COME: The wacky BlogHer recap! You know I have stories to tell!

The End

You know what today is? Today is the last day of November and that means that this post marks the end of NaBloPoMo. Thirty posts in thirty days.

I can now say that I have completed NaBloPoMo for five consecutive years and I think this entitles me to a parade. Or free lattes. Actually, let's go with the lattes.

It's not easy to write every day but, every November, I do it and I learn things about myself and about writing. Forcing myself to string words together in some coherent way on a regular basis makes me think. As I root around in the dark corners of my mind trying to find things to write about, I find stories I'd forgotten or I see old stories in a new light.

I also get to learn about all of you who, for whatever reason, keep coming back here. Sometimes you share your funny stories in the comments and sometimes you share the hard ones. In a way, we do NaBloPoMo together. I know - that's so cheesy/corny/trite - but if I can't get away with saying something like that after typing my little fingers to the bone for you for the past 30 days, then when can I? Ha.

And now...it's over. Kinda anti-climactic, huh? That parade of lattes is sounding pretty good now, isn't it? It reminds me of the feeling I had on Christmas morning the year I'd secretly opened all of my presents and rewrapped long before the actual day had arrived. It's a bit of a bummer. But...there is always next year.

So...what do we do now?

Meet the Parents

I love the expression "too many irons in the fire" though I often think of steam irons and imagine them hovering over the flames as if they are about to steam the fire into submission. The truth is the fire wins most often. So, yeah - I have too many irons in the fire but I frequently mention all my irons so we don't need to dwell. My point in bringing this up is that, in order to survive NaBloPoMo, I have to be realistic. I am taking a class on the personal essay and have writing deadlines for that. I am also still in the Loft mentorship program and have writing deadlines for that. I also have another book project and I have a couple of deadlines for that. Let us not forget that I also write once a week for Aiming Low and have deadlines for that.

So many deadlines. What this means is that, on occasion, I may highlight an Aiming Low post here and give additional background information or insight about the post. Today is one of those days.

I have a post up at Aiming Low today called Robert's Rules of Disorder which is about the first time I took Luisa home to meet my mother.

Last week in my essay class, I shared a short essay and then talked about the process of creating it. I'd never done that before and it was a lot of fun...mostly because it made me feel like there was actually a method to my madness and that I write with intention. Also, it made me feel incredibly smart and who doesn't love that?

So, I thought I would explain the process for writing the Robert's Rules of Disorder post. For me, every post or piece starts with a very simple idea. Sometimes it's an image, a sentence or a simple memory and, sometimes, I start with a single joke even though everyone and their otter says that you should never do that. Then, I build the post around that. I don't know that this is a very literary way of going about things but I'm no Ernest Hemingway. Thankfully.

For the rules post, I remembered taking Luisa home that first time and remembered my sister and I reacting to the fact that she had disagreed with mom. This was an unspoken rule in our family. Of course, this made me think of all of the other rules families have so I started telling the story and realized the rules inherent in everything involving that trip. The final piece was to think more generally about rules and no one thinks of rules without thinking of Robert's Rules. So, then I played on that and the finished post was born.

See - there is a process after all and even a gerbil's brain has some type of logic.

Now, go read the post and give me love in the comments! Also, if there are any topics or ideas (or questions you want me to answer) for NaBloPoMo, please let me know. Help me out!